The recent freeing up of political space in the SADC[1] region has given political formations and parties the opportunity to engage with the political process, particularly elections in a much deeper way than before. These parties however continue to face challenges in effectively monitoring elections for the consolidation of democracy in their countries. This was highlighted by political parties attending a workshop recently organised by EISA. The workshop entitled ‘The Role of Political Parties in Poll Watching for Credible Elections’ was held at the Kopanong Resort and Conference Centre in Johannesburg on 6 November 2007. Twenty-five representatives of ruling and opposition parties from Botswana, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania and Zambia attended the workshop. During the workshop the parties shared experiences and best practices on how to be more effective in the monitoring of elections.

Whilst the democratisation and consolidation process has received endorsement from the regional and international community through the deployment of regional and international election observer missions, many have continued to argue that the credibility of the process itself is better judged and authenticated by the key local stakeholders especially the political parties and the electorate. Unfortunately in many cases, the activities of political parties in SADC do not go far beyond contesting for the votes and mandate of the electorate.  This is unfortunate given the fact that at least in Southern Africa, political parties are the drivers of change and have the potential to be the key agents of that change.

The workshop identified weak institutional capacity and insufficient human and financial resources as the main shortcomings for political parties in monitoring elections. Few parties have permanent members and this situation is often exacerbated by the threats to life, that citizens may face by simply associating with some (mostly opposition) parties. This obviously militates against faithful party allegiance and means that the pool from which parties can draw their poll watchers is small.

Most parties do not have permanent mechanisms for poll watching and cannot organise themselves in enough time at election time.  Those volunteering as poll watchers do not automatically receive remuneration and thus the quality of persons available for poll watching may be poor. Lack of resources also affects the capacity of the parties and candidates to train the poll watchers in the principles of credible elections, effective monitoring techniques and the collection and transmission of information.  This has led to the deployment of untrained poll watchers and contributed to the poor quality of information collected. Political parties may also not possess at the higher level, the capacity or ability, to analyse the information in a manner that is rigorous enough to make the analysis credible. Hence some parties will seemingly make wild accusations about the electoral offences which cannot be proven in courts of law where this becomes necessary.

Electoral authorities may undertake to assist political parties by either providing funds for the deployment of poll watchers and/or by training them at the same time as electoral staff such as is done in Lesotho. Unfortunately this may lead to cases where poll watchers are simply     “… in it for the money” and bear no loyalty to the candidate or party which they ostensibly represent.  Yet one of the key roles of poll watchers is to protect the interests of their candidates and/or parties.

The representative of the Democratic People’s Party of Malawi noted that in the last national election in 2004, poor remuneration resulted in a high level of absenteeism amongst the poll watchers. The party did not have enough resources to provide transport to the poll watchers who sometimes walked long distances and were tired and too weak to work by the time they arrived at the station.  Additionally, as a result of intimidation, some poll watchers did not feel confident enough to challenge electoral officials or even to be seen to be recording electoral offences that they had witnessed on their reporting forms.

Problems with communicating with agents once they were deployed into the interior were cited by the representative of RENAMO Union- Electoral (Mozambique). In some instances, agents were allegedly not allowed by the police and ruling party supporters to access district and provincial tabulation centres. Lack of information particularly about polling locations also prevents political parties from ensuring adequate coverage of all the polling stations.  The parties also lamented the high cost of voters’ rolls and the inability to access them even where the funds are available because of the unwillingness of some electoral authorities.

Participants discussed how to address these challenges by sharing experiences on the criteria for recruiting party agent, factors for training and deploying poll watchers and how to make information collection more effective.

Criteria for recruiting poll watchers

• Strong allegiance and loyal support to the party.
• Basic education and the ability to speak and write the local language of the area where the poll watcher would be deployed.  
• Knowledge of  the area of deployment and of the local cultural and political context
• Residence near the stations where s/he will be deployed and should be known by the voters.
• The agent should be credible and must have a sound mind.
• Training and knowledge of the context and of the electoral history. 

Critical factors for training and deploying poll watchers

• Awareness about the importance of training poll watchers
• Mobilising enough funds for training poll watchers.
• Involvement of poll watchers at all stages of the election, beginning with the registration process
• Accreditation of poll watchers according to the laid down procedures.
• Parties/candidates should endeavour to have at least poll two poll watchers per polling station. 
  

Effective methodologies for effective information gathering by poll watchers

• Comprehensive training of  poll watchers
• Parties need to ensure that poll watchers actually come to polling stations by collaborating with presiding officers.
• Ensure literacy,  It is not uncommon to find poll watchers that are not literate and who cannot understand intricacies of the voting process and are therefore least suited to the monitoring of the process.
• Poll watchers must use a  standardized  form or checklist to guide them in collecting information in the polling stations
• Poll watchers  should also be  provided these checklist plus pen and paper in order to allow them to record the information which they collect
• Those who are monitoring voting need to be given voters’ rolls.
• There should be a well defined communications structure which poll watchers have access to in order to report any anomalies or urgent issues. This can either be cell phone or other forms of telecommunications or even as a way of relaying information by word of mouth
• Parties   should have access to transport in order to relay information to other members and colleagues outside of the station as well as to get to and from the stations.
  

Participants also noted the importance of equitable gender representation amongst the poll watchers as well as the need to produce a comprehensive report after the elections.

Whilst noting the challenges facing political parties participants at the workshop noted that the knowledge gained at the workshop would assist them in improving their poll watching skills. In his closing remarks, the manager of EISA’s Elections and Political Processes department informed the meeting that as EISA would be using the experiences that the participants have shared to develop specific poll watching programmes for countries having elections in 2008 and beyond.